Jolanda Berends
Jolanda Berends (1977) studied Cultural and Social Development at the HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht (2002) and Cultural Anthropology at VU Amsterdam (2007). Since 2003 she has been working as a lecturer in social work at HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht and since 2018 as a researcher at the Research group Participation and Urban Development.
Since February 2021 Jolanda started her PhD-research ‘School and neighbourhood join forces for citizenship development’. The aim of this research is to connect the expertise of social welfare professionals and teachers in primary education, in order to achieve interprofessional collaboration in the socio-educational domain. This collaboration contributes to the development of citizenship of children in primary school age. Next to this she is involved in an international research on added values of an international experience during the social work study.
"Think global, act local and be social"
Her interest in diversity issues was amplified during her bachelor internship at the 'Ethnologisches Museum’ in Berlin. For her master graduation research, she investigated the memories of social inequality of local rural people in Russia, both before and after the fall of the USSR. She was intrigued by the way local villagers perceive social inequality as central to everyday life.
Fields of expertise:
- Community development
- Diversity
- International Social Work
